The First: What do you see?Caleb: Strength?ñ And the loneliness that comes with real strength~Buffy, Season 7~

The hero is a macabre figure, on the one hand they are a champion of justice, on the other, throughout their triumphs they must sacrifice everything they have ever known. Kuchelain was forced to kill his best friend in defense of his honour and homeland. Wiliam H. Bonnie was killed for avenging the death of his benefactor over a cattle ranch license. Odin hung himself from a tree and lay near death for nine days in order to gain occult knowledge. Jesus was nailed to a tree because of politics (no matter which version of the story you believe). These are our heroes, not celebrators of life, not happy people, but grim spectres, guardians of death and keepers of the lost. They start off with everything and it is shattered, then stripped away piece by piece, until finally they are a shambling wreck, a master made of cuts and bruises on every surface, in every dimension. Do they give up? No. They go along, knowing they will always lose, they will always fail, someone somewhere. Why do they do it? and why is it so hard? Because we are told that it is a hard path to walk, because we are conditioned and brainwashed into believing that the choice to rise up is an agony. Why? Because the choice to rise up has two paths?ñ

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Magneto: You're a god among insects. Never let anyone tell you any different.~X2~

Mr Glass: Because I couldn't know who I was until I found out who you were. Every hero has a villain, often they were best friends even brothers.~Unbreakable~

That fork has two paths, the path of "suffering" and of "right" and the path of "gratification" and of "wrong." We are dissuaded from making the choice to stand up in the first place because it is "far easier" to become the villain and satisfy our desires than it is to do what is "right." We are given animated corpses to dance a grim fandango for us because we are unwilling to change one thing?ñ Our minds. We are scared into believing it is so easy to succumb, to fall by the wayside, become corrupted, and destroy the world. But because of the way we see, we cannot understand why it is easy as breathing and why it is as simple as walking.

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Joshu Went to a Hermit's hut and called, "Is anyone at home? Is anyone at home?" The Hermit thrust up his fist. Joshu said, "The water is too shallow to anchor here," and went away. He went to another Hermit's hut and called, "Is anyone at home? Is anyone at home?" The Hermit thrust up a fist. Joshu said, "freely you give, freely you take away. Freely you bestow life, freely you destroy," and made a profound bow.~The World: A gateway (commentaries on the Mumonkan [by Albert Low])~

The above quote is just another cavern problem; A seemingly irresolvable dichotomy. The two hermits did exactly the same thing, but the master Joshu responds differently to both of them. Where is the illusion in this cavern? It is in Joshu. It is not the hermits who are different, it is Joshu. Yet Joshu does not change because he scolds one hermit and praises the other. Why? Because his morality is not absolute. Joshu has passed two different judgements on the same action yet Joshu has not changed, not even his mind has changed. The separation is in us. We see something wrong, with making separate determinations of the same action, and there is the bite in this koan: we see 2 Joshus, just the same way we separate the hero from a villain.Do you see?

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Vito Cornelius:Mr. President if I may. This creature hasn't come for war or conquest or politics. It only cares about one thing. To exterminate life.~Fifth Element~

The Hero's path is just as simple and easy as the villain's. That is why it is just like breathing. We see law and rule and precedent and trend, but we do not see life. We do not see the celebration, all we see is imminent danger and possible death, because we separate ourselves from our world. As overdone as it sounds, it's true.As Penumbral said: "Adjust yourself." Do we separate the world from ourselves and make it everyone else's fault? Or do we adjust ourselves and take responsibility for who and what we are? Where are we going to place the locus of control? In our hands, or someone else's? Somewhere on a general level we are choosing the same option in every situation. Either "I am responsible" or "I am not responsible." That is the paradigm shift. The shift between 'the will to power' and 'the will to truth.' We can either flail along and believe in absolutes, or choose. We can choose anything. We are told that these people are above us, that they do things beyond the norm, are capable of things beyond our capacity; that we must strive to even stand in their shadow. It is only the most driven of us that will pass this test, only the bravest will survive. They will give up everything they've ever known for a thankless life of unforgiving torment. What is being adjusted here I ask you? We tear down our heroes as much as we demonize our villains. They stand up because we "can't," they have chosen a road full of danger and risk, and we prostate ourselves at their feet, thankful that someone will do what we all can, -but instead- run away from.Standing up, doing the "impossible" is to place oneself in this realm, Remember?ñ

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It must not place itself above or beyond the considerations of the international community, but delete itself from them entirely.~Discourse 12~

In this regard there is a mondo in which someone asked Joshu, the one who is beyond good and bad, is he liberated or not?" Joshu answered, "He is not." The questioner continued, "Why not?" Joshu retorted, "Because he is within good and evil.~The World: A gateway (Albert Low)~

you are removing yourself from normal considerations. As Albert Low notes in his commentary on Joshu and the hermits. When we stand up, when there are no more absolutes, who determines good and evil? The one inside it! We are not liberated from all judgement, but we become the makers of morality. We are gods among insects and it is easy and natural as breathing. When the choice is god or insect, why do we choose insect? We're already there, unstoppable, insaitable, yet we lay down and die because whatever box we break out of is inside another one?ñIf you can make the rules can't you break them?The three most powerful words ever spoken:BREAKTHE RULES......................................................................DISCOURSE HALTED UNTIL I GET ANGRY AGAIN.

Where do you end and where does the universe begin?This is the limit... what we call humanityHumanity is endless

One must still have chaos in one to give birth to a dancing starand I tell you you must still have chaos in yourselves! Chaos is endless, the chao is a single unit of chaos and it is also all chaos... all chaos is one and none and all...

Where do we give up?Why do we give up?What is a limit?Why do we choose to give up? To fail? To die? There is no choice... only choice... every choice is a tie that binds a razor that cuts and hamstrigs us... there is no choice... all things are inevitable... then why do we... us... here and now fail? Because we must? because it is inevitable? But it is also inevitable that we cannot fail. Ever.

We are told that because we are human we have limits, that we must give up, reach our tolerance and trip over our own feet as we run at ten times the speed of sound. Where do we give up? Where do you end and where does the universe begin? Where you give up is where you end, where you give up is where you die... The limit of your humanity. where you hamstring yourself...

That is why we kill our champions, because we give up.

We are told that there is no victory without loss, no triumph without tragedy, no beginning without an end. I say bollocks! Who has laid down the rules? Who can break them? You set the limits you can also remove them. Break the rules. Can you? Can you allow yourself to?

Will you?

In other days the maps of the world were marked with demons and serpents where people had yet to explore, the unknown is a terror. and it is the unknown we venture into when there are no limits and no boundaries. It is the unknown we become when we break the rules and make our choice. It is the unknown that we fear will break us, but nothing is knowable. We fear that if there are no limits nothing can stop us, and we will have lost the oh so "noble" struggle that examplifies our humanity. What do you lose if you can do anything? Go anywhere? Freedom has a very different meaning then. Freedom is a prison, for there is no more conquest. What a macabre dance that is. We stab ourselves so that we may cut off our own arm and claim that we have avenged our wrong.

Show me your karma, and I will show you the history of your self hatred.Show me your hero, and I will show you a voodoo doll.Show me nothing, and I will show you everything.